Industrial Revolution Dbq

The Industrial Revolution was a transformation in Great Britain during the 18th and 19th century that involved great innovations in technologies, manufacturing, agriculture, and transportations. Changes in government, society, and trade also proved that the Industrial Revolution was a period of time where new ideas thrived and that countries around the world were greatly affected. The immense growth in population, which mainly consisted of workers and laborers, the effective waterways and abundant natural resources, and the political stability of Great Britain all caused the country to become the very first one to experience an Industrial Revolution. The population of Europe rapidly increased during the 18th and 19th century, going from 5.5 million to 18 million people in just a period of 163 years. This growth gave the Europeans a more effective resistance against diseases. They were also provided with food supplies, which included crops that originally came from the Americas. This lead to the growth of trade among local markets as well as foreign countries. People had the opportunity to marry earlier and
Farmers started growing new crops such as potatoes, turnips, and legumes because they were much easier to grow. Landowners were open to the idea of using new methods to harvest and grow crops. They "enclosed" their lands which caused farm laborers to begin to move to the cities in search for work. Factories switched from using water to coal as a power source because it was much cheaper. People also had jobs in iron-ores and tin mining. Britain produced ships and naval supplies and had advanced navigational tools to help merchants go abroad to trade. Britain was active in overseas trading because land transportation was very expensive. Therefore, they used a network of canals, their lands along the coast, and accessible rivers to trade